Azur Lane, Episode 4: SAKURA STORM – Cloak and Dagger

The Akagi fleet returns to the Sakura Empire. The Royal Navy seeks information on their Orochi Project.

Episode 04: “SAKURA STORM – Cloak and Dagger”

Hmm.

How much does the Azur Lane anime love its fans? This much — the Light Cruiser Sheffield in the game has an outfit called “Cloak and Dagger.” The Maid Corps of the Royal Navy is the Intelligence Operations wing for Queen Elizabeth. How cool is that?

Something else very cool about this week’s episode was the noticeable attention paid to its artwork. The lighting and atmospherics team for Azur Lane must have jumped off the third episode early to work on this one. Just look at that beautiful ambient light, those sharp shadows, and those rich background colors. Enterprise’s flat face was in cloudy, stormy seas last episode, so who cares, right? Well, they also made Belfast’s face flat, so I care! But the producers made up for that slight downgrade in animation quality with this episode. That was the correct choice, since this was the introduction of the Sakura Empire’s naval base. I really enjoyed the fantastical setting of a whole island made to look like the grounds of a temple complex. Having the fox spirits running around was a nice touch too.

Azur Lane also put in some good storytelling with slow revelations of Akagi’s motivations. I wasn’t surprised with how her secret project kept the vital detail of a live enemy on their base from the other boats, because that usually happens in these kinds of shows, but there were lots of fun plot seeds planted all over the place for Akagi and the other characters. Seeing Ayanami with her friends confirmed for the audience that Laffey and Javelin don’t have unrequited feelings. I’m also curious about Takao’s mentor relationship with Zuikaku and how Atago fits in. I just want to see Takao and Atago in the same scene together as soon as possible.

Heh.

Oh. Azur Lane is going to Japan, I mean, the Sakura Empire. Nice rising sun imagery here.

Ayanami has a cute trio of destroyer friends. Zuikaku has issues about defeating the Grey Ghost.

Belfast on Day 1 of her Enterprise Pygmalion project. She’s just going through all her things. Judging. Enterprise gives us a preview of the front of her future Azur Lane hug pillow cover.

Royal milk tea means pouring the milk first, then the tea. Noted. Belfast wants Enterprise to lead an elegant life. Good luck, Belfast!

The Chinese boats of Azur Lane immediately opened a Chinese food stall. Such entrepreneurial spirit! The Dragon Empery sisters have pandas while Unicorn has U-chan. Hammann continues to provide comic relief. There were no violent disasters, so San Diego was safe. Laffey goes on and on about Ayanami.

Ping Hai and Ning Hai went to scout some Siren activity, but found a huge fleet of high-class drones. An actual Siren was present, controlling them. It’s good to know what these girls look like. We may be seeing one really soon. I hope Azur Lane explains what the Sirens’ goals are at some point during the season.

Oh ho. The maid boats are gentleman, er, gentlelady spies!

So, this is what Nagato looks like in this game — a little lady princess. It doesn’t sound like Akagi is telling Nagato the whole story about this Black Box being a Mental Cube. Project Orochi — bringing to mind a large, mythical sea serpent. Kind of like a Siren…

They’re justifying their preemptive attack to keep Azur Lane from fighting the Siren while they use Siren technology. There are definitely some holes in the plan, which sounds deliberate. Nagato says the same thing about warfare never changing like Enterprise does. They should have stayed allies. Akagi has yandere love for the world. Uh, that’s not a good thing.

Z23 is just trying to have some quiet tea time. Keep it down, you little brats! Aw, maybe the Azur Lane little girls reminded Ayanami of her destroyer girlfriends.

Takao and Zuikaku have a “special” relationship? Does Atago know about this? Nice, but ouch. Takao just wanted to pat Zuikaku on the back for reassurance, but she’s too strong.

Hee. I’m dying. The Sakura Empire has the same yellow maintenance chicks that Azur Lane has. Yes, let’s have one of the clumsy boats be a gentlelady spy… Now Sheffield, she looks exceedingly competent. I like her already. At least Edinburgh is self-aware. Why was she assigned to back up Sheffield?

Uh oh. Akashi went somewhere she wasn’t supposed to be. Will she be the first defector from the Sakura Empire? Yahari. This isn’t just Siren technology. This is making a deal with the devil. Sirens need to eat Mental Cubes? So the attack on Azur Lane was vampiric? Whenever I see hexagons and red light, I think of Neuroi from Strike Witches.

This Siren is called Observer. Nice tentacles. Observer’s stated goal of Project Orochi is “to build an Ark to carry every wish across the ocean.” That’s poetic, vague, and disturbing, since we know she has to eat the Mental Cubes of ship girls. Nice priorities with her fashion sense too. She’ll wear a top, but no bottoms. I like her already? She’s dragging her teeth against Akagi’s face… What an evocative scene. Plus, that hint of the bargain Akagi has made — something about a reunion. A ship the Siren ate (or whatever) that Akgagi wants back? Or Akagi herself?

Akashi saw something terrible. You and me both, sister. Tentacle grope! Oops. They’ll have to kill her now. Yeah! Here’s your 007 moment, Azur Lane-style. I think Sheffield knows Gun Fu… That ludicrous outfit is a maid uniform! Har! Akagi saw something underneath Sheffield’s skirt that made her blush! I’m very curious about Sheffield’s undergirding now.

Nice catch, Edinburgh!

The point of this battle, like all the previous ones, is that these awesome Azur Lane boat girls should be fighting the enemy Sirens instead of each other. Yup. Sheffield knows Gun Fu. Ah. Now we see why Edinburgh was put on this mission. Explosion! I did not expect to see Takao’s derp face this quickly.

Akagi is under the impression that Azur Lane will “nurture” the Black Box for them. Just by having it on base? This is good stuff to make us curious about the mysteries of the Black Box, Observer, and how Akagi got involved.

Ayanami will protect her friends, but she has friends in Azur Lane too!